Brazil set to be a new horizon for Amazon

Amazon Brazil is continuing to develop and now the ecommerce giant is improving its fulfilment network in Latin America’s most populous country.

Amazon is reportedly looking to lease a 50,000 square metre warehouse just outside the city of Sao Paulo. The logistics investment would be four times the size of its current book storage and despatch facility in Brazil. It also suggests that Amazon Logistics or Fulfilment is on the way and they will possibly start offering FBA services too. Currently Amazon relies exclusively on third party couriers.

Amazon’s Brazil operations started to change last autumn, as we wrote here. Amazon has been operating in Brazil for more than five years already but has predominantly sold books. It has since branched out to consumer electronics and tech. And crucially it’s also opening its doors to third party sellers too, although no firm announcements have been made as yet.

Alex Szapiro, Country Manager for Amazon in Brazil, said last year of the company’s ambitions :

“Today, more than half of total paid units sold on Amazon worldwide are from small businesses that offer their products through Amazon Marketplace. Our goal is to provide an amazing experience to consumers, while helping local entrepreneurs to grow, just like we have done with booksellers since we opened our Marketplace for Books only a few months ago.”

And it’s no wonder that Amazon is increasingly looking to Brazil for growth. It’s believed that two thirds of Brazil’s 209 million people have access to the web but ecommerce remains highly under developed and accounts for just 5% of the country’s retail sector. But it has doubled in the past four years and is forecast to keep growing annually at a double-digit pace. Logistical problems, especially surrounding delivery, have also held back ecommerce because fulfilment is difficult in such a huge country.